New Zealand poet and actor Peter Bland has been awarded the Prime Minister's Award. It was given for Literary Achievement in the Poetry category.

Bland uses and everyday language and lives in a modern world, urban, suburban. He deploys voices, his dramatic monologues linking, as it were, his actorly and poetic identities. In New Zealand he co-founded Downstage and was its artistic director 1964-68.  He has worked as a stage and television actor and several of his own plays have been produced. For many years he lived in the United Kingdom (he was born in Scarborough in 1934) before returning home. He has published several poetry volumes in New Zealand and the UK.  Coming Ashore (Steele Roberts) is his most recent collection. Carcanet published a major Selected Poems in 1998.